Chrome Web Store Explained

Chrome Web Store
Website:chromewebstore.google.com

Chrome Web Store is Google's online store for its Chrome web browser. As of 2022, Chrome Web Store hosts about 123,000 extensions and 29,000 themes.[1]

History

Chrome Web Store was publicly unveiled in December 2010,[2] and was opened on February 11, 2011, with the release of Google Chrome 9.0.[3] A year later it was redesigned to "catalyze a big increase in traffic, across downloads, users, and total number of apps".[4] As of June 2012, there were 750 million total installs of content hosted on Chrome Web Store.[5]

Some extension developers have sold their extensions to third-parties who then incorporated adware.[6] [7] In 2014, Google removed two such extensions from Chrome Web Store after many users complained about unwanted pop-up ads.[8] The following year, Google acknowledged that about five percent of visits to its own websites had been altered by extensions with adware.[9] [10] [11]

Malware

Malware remains a problem on Chrome Web Store.[12] [13] [14] [15] In January 2018, Researchers from security firm ICEBRG found four malicious extensions with more than 500,000 combined downloads.[12] [16] In February 2021, Google blocked "The Great Suspender", a popular extension with 2,000,000 users after it was reported that malicious code was added to it.[17] [18] [19]

Chrome used to allow extensions hosted on Chrome Web Store to also be installed at the developer's website for the sake of convenience.[20] However, this became a malware vector, so it was removed in 2018.[21]

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Breaking Down The Chrome Web Store. ChromeStats. 28 December 2022.
  2. Web site: Kincaid. Jason. Sales Are At A Trickle On Google's The Chrome Web Store. TechCrunch. 4 January 2011.
  3. Web site: Erik . Kay . Aaron . Boodman . A dash of speed, 3D and apps . Chrome Blog . . February 3, 2011 . March 9, 2017.
  4. Web site: Empson. Rip. New The Chrome Web Store Proves To Be A Boon For Developers Above (And Below) The Fold. TechCrunch. 5 December 2011. 5 December 2011 .
  5. Web site: Vikas SN . The Lowdown: Google I/O 2012 Day 2 – 310M Chrome Users, 425M Gmail & More . MediaNama . 2012-06-29 . 2013-06-14.
  6. Web site: Adware vendors buy Chrome Extensions to send ad- and malware-filled updates. Ars Technica. 17 January 2014. 20 January 2014.
  7. Web site: Adware Vendors Buy and Abuse Chrome Extensions. Bruce Schneier. 21 Jan 2014.
  8. News: Winkler. Rolfe. Google Removes Two Chrome Extensions Amid Ad Uproar. blogs.wsj.com. 19 January 2014. Wall Street Journal. 17 March 2014.
  9. Web site: Ad Injection at Scale: Assessing Deceptive Advertisement Modifications . https://web.archive.org/web/20150605041757/https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/research.google.com/en//pubs/archive/43346.pdf . dead . 2015-06-05 .
  10. Web site: Superfish injects ads into 5 percent of all Google page views . . IDG.
  11. Web site: Superfish injects ads in one in 25 Google page views . CIO . . 2015-06-03 . 2019-12-11 . https://web.archive.org/web/20191211155152/https://www.cio.com.au/article/574450/superfish-injects-ads-one-25-google-page-views/ . dead .
  12. Web site: Security firm ICEBRG uncovers 4 malicious Chrome extensions - gHacks Tech News. www.ghacks.net. 16 January 2018. 2018-12-15.
  13. Web site: Google's bad track record of malicious Chrome extensions continues - gHacks Tech News. www.ghacks.net. 11 May 2018. 2018-12-15.
  14. Web site: Chrome Extension Devs Use Sneaky Landing Pages after Google Bans Inline Installs. BleepingComputer. en-us. 2018-12-15.
  15. Web site: Chrome's inline extension install ban already bypassed - gHacks Tech News. www.ghacks.net. 11 October 2018. 2018-12-15.
  16. Web site: Google Chrome extensions with 500,000 downloads found to be malicious . 17 January 2018 . Ars Technica . 2018-12-30.
  17. Web site: Google kills The Great Suspender. ZDNet. 2021-05-29.
  18. Web site: The Great Suspender Chrome extension's fall from grace. 2021-05-30. BleepingComputer. en-us.
  19. Web site: What happens when a Chrome extension with 2m+ users changes hands, raises red flags, doesn't document updates? Let's find out. www.theregister.com. 2021-05-29.
  20. Web site: Using Inline Installation - Google Chrome. developer.chrome.com. 2018-12-14.
  21. Web site: Improving extension transparency for users. Chromium Blog. en. 2018-12-15.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Chrome Web Store".

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